House of Cards Paperback Bundle

Prologue

Wide, terrified eyes gazed at me in the glint of the steel until they disappeared in the gush of the liquid. It flowed down the metal—hot and thick and seeking my fingers.

Someone was screaming. Horrible, piercing shrieks that made it impossible to concentrate. Impossible to understand what was going on.

Why wouldn’t they stop? Why wouldn’t they—

Oh, wait…

I put my hand to my raw, aching throat and smeared it with blood.

The person screaming was me.

Chapter One

“Ugh. Size zero.” Olivia picked up my uniform with two fingers and tossed it over her shoulder. “I used to be a size zero too, little show-off. Before you wreaked havoc on my hips.”

My reflection rolled her eyes. “How many times should I apologize for being born?”

“Until I get my figure back!”

I burst into laughter, and after a second, Mom did too. Our giggles filled the room until a soft whine cut through our mirth.

I closed my lips with a snap and looked at Adam in the mirror. Please don’t wake up. Please don’t wake up!

The baby stirred from the comfort of my bed, scrunching up his little face, while I held my breath. After a few tense seconds, his face smoothed out and he settled back into sleep.

I relaxed and reached for my brush. Adam had fought his nap all morning, screaming and wailing so loud the neighbors must have thought we were murdering someone in here. It took so long to get him down that I was in serious danger of being late on my first day to Evergreen Academy.

“That was a close one,” said Olivia. She reached over and pulled the blanket up to the baby’s chin. She settled back onto the comforter, propping herself up on one arm, and watched me in the mirror.

Olivia, as she insisted I call her whenever we were in public, still looked amazing for her thirty-five years, despite how she complained about me ruining her figure. Mom’s chestnut hair fell in soft waves to her shoulders, framing a heart-shaped face, Greek nose, and piercing green eyes with flecks of gold.

That face was my face. We looked so much alike people asked if she was my older sister and that pleased Mom to no end. Gray had yet to touch her brown locks and wrinkles dare not grace her skin. She was still young and in the prime of her life. Just ask her.

“You sure about this, kid?” The hand brushing my hair stilled as I pulled myself out of my musings. I met Olivia’s eyes in the glass. “This fancy new school,” she clarified. “Things have been different for you at Joe Young High. You’ve made friends.”

“I’ll make new friends,” I insisted. I smiled at my reflection, drawing my lips across my teeth and grinning widely. The smile trembled as if the muscles had forgotten how to do this. It began to look like a grimace and I dropped it.

It’s alright. Things will be different from now on. Soon… all of my smiles will be real.

“This is a great opportunity, Mom,” I continued. “This is the opportunity. Of course I’m sure about Evergreen.”

Olivia sighed. “I just don’t want you to think you have to go because of—”

My grip tightened on the brush. “Mom.”

“—everything that happened—”

“Mom!”

Adam shifted at my shout, but I didn’t pay it any mind as I spun on Mom. She met my glare without flinching. This was Serious Olivia. This side of Mom and I were barely acquainted.

“Don’t give me that look,” she said calmly. “I only want to make sure you know that you’re in control. If you don’t want to go, then you don’t have to.”

The tension leaked out of my shoulders. “I know. I’m sorry.” I took a breath and released it. “But I do want this, Mom. Kids from all over the world fight to get into this place. Having a school like Evergreen Academy on your application pretty much guarantees automatic admission to any university in the country. I’ll go, graduate, get into a good school, get an even better job, and then”—my eyes swept my room—“I’ll get us out of this place.”

Olivia studied me for a moment, then she offered me a smile. “Glad to hear it, kid. You get your mom a big house and deck her out in diamonds and pearls. It’s the least you can do.”

I snorted. “Let me guess, it’s the least I can do after messing with your figure?”

She tapped her nose and winked. “Exactly.”

I shook my head and took the five steps to the other side of the bed to pick my uniform off the floor. My room was just that small.

I gazed around the space with the royal blue monogrammed fabric dangling from my fingertips. My old life and my new.

The cracks in the plaster greeted my eyes. I had tried to cover the worst with posters, especially the hole made when one of Mom’s ex-boyfriends put his fist through the wall, but there was no covering the hideous puke green the landlord refused to let us paint over.

There was no disguising the brown stains dotting the ceiling due to the leaky roof. There was no hiding how cramped the space was, made even smaller by Adam’s crib pushed into the corner that used to have my desk. That desk was in the living/kitchen/dining room now. We had been eating off of it since Mom’s last boyfriend broke our former dining table and we couldn’t afford to get a new one.

This tiny two-bedroom apartment in the poorest part of Wakefield had been my house for the last twelve years. Living in government housing is as glorious as one would expect, but as I often reminded myself, it was better than moving from one friend’s couch to the other after Mom’s parents closed the door in their pregnant, college dropout, twenty-year-old daughter’s face. And it was certainly better than the street corner we lived on for a time when I was two.

This has been all I’ve ever known… but now my life was going to change in every way.

I pulled open the door of my wardrobe and ducked behind it. It shielded me as I stripped out of my PJs and into my new uniform.

The top of the dress clung to my curves while the skirt flared at the waist. It was solid blue except for the stiff white collar wrapped around my neck. There was a definite Wednesday Addams vibe coming off this outfit but it was still quite stylish for a school uniform.

“In that case,” Mom spoke up while I tugged my long, brown hair out of the dress. “Since you’re skipping about going to this place, there’s no reason for me not to go out with Marcy and Jeanine tonight. They invited me out to celebrate my kid getting into the best school in the country.”

“Um, there is a reason.” I poked my head out to give her a look. “Who is going to watch Adam?”

She waved that away. “That’s what babysitters are for. There’s this new club that opened on Fourth Street. I’ve been dying to check it out, and if they’re buying, I’m all for it.”

I shoved the wardrobe closed and hurried back to the vanity to finish my hair. I needed to hurry up. I couldn’t be late on my first day.

“Okay, but who are you going to get?” I asked as I pulled my hair back and wrangled it into a scrunchie. “Not Monica. The last time she spent the whole time running up our cable bill and didn’t change his diaper all night. And not Dorcas, she—”

Mom heaved herself off my bed. “Relax, relax. Mrs. Potter on the fifth floor is going to watch him. You don’t have to worry, Val.” She came up behind me and flicked the back of my head.

“Hey!”

“This isn’t my first kid. I know what I’m doing.”

“That’s debatable,” I mumbled under my breath, but not low enough.

“What was that?” Mom grabbed me from behind. I shrieked as she wrestled me to the floor. “You watch that sass mouth of yours,” she cried as she peppered my face with kisses. “I’m the gold standard of moms. It doesn’t get better than me.”

I was laughing too hard to answer back. It had been a while since we messed around like this… and even longer since I laughed.

A wail shattered our fun.

“Look what you did now.” Mom got to her feet and picked up a crying Adam. “I’ll get this one a bottle while you finish getting ready.”

She took him out and I scrambled to do as she said. In no time, I was standing at the door of the apartment with my suitcases at my feet. This was it.

There was a sense of finality in the rickety elevator ride down. I knew I would be back at the close of the semester, but still, I couldn’t fight the feeling that everything would change.

Good. I want everything to change. I gave a smile another try. Evergreen Academy is going to be the best thing that ever happened to me.

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